The New Boutique
by shallwedance
Summary: Sequel to New Beginnings, should make sense without reading that first. The opening night of the little dress shop and already there's a forseeable problem. It's pretty time-consuming. What will the boys do without the girls? Should be amusing so read on!


_**Hey, quite a few asked for a sequel so who am I to disappoint? **_

_**Disclaimer: I don't own Twilight or anything like that etc. etc. etc. **_

**_OH! The only thing likely tocause any confusion is Bella's power: illusions. In New Beginnings she got so much power that she can make physical changes now so that is how the dresses are made and stuff. _**

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Chapter One

_The Birth of the Boutique_

"Alright, action stations people!" Alice shouted through the house. The only way to describe her methods for motivating the troops is to imagine replacing a slave-drivers whip with words, although of course she would always insist that they were meant 'in jest'; although quite how threatening to burn the entire project to the floor, along with Edwards CD collection (she had said this after finding us both, covered in paint and giggling in a closet), delivered with a face of such school-teacherly discipline, could be construed in an amiable fashion, I will never know.

Considering that the project was my little cottage I think I took the threat quite well as I upended my paint bucket over her head. Edward and I stalked off with a skip in our step.

"How did you _not _see that coming?" we kept asking with big grins whenever we saw her to numerous scowls. I could only shudder at the payback we were going to get.

But as her methods of organisation outshone anyone else's, we listened to her and my house became a beacon of fashion. I had moved into the Cullen household as Alice had pleaded, showing through a full business-meeting info booklet that my cottage was situated perfectly as a shop for a little dress-shop such as ours. In the end, the only option was to agree to her incessant begging. I cracked, just as she was about to get on her knees to prostrate herself at my feet. She sure didn't care what people thought of her as soon as she set her mind on having something; she usually got it. And I wasn't completely averse to living with the most kind people I had associated with in a long time.

Like the fact that it had to be hand-done, I couldn't just change the wallpaper in less than the blink of an eye, but had to go at human speed to get every detail correct; as if we could mess anything up. But that is not to say that we did not exploit my illusions, instead I periodically skipped ahead at the walls we were painting in an exact half millimetre thick coat. I also, once the walls were finished, changed the colour of the glossed walls, turning them from their rich purple, to royal blue; or orange. I made a beautiful pattern in yellow and brown but, needless to say, that did not go down well. It wasn't until she tore a page from my favourite Wodehouse book (at that moment, which one I preferred changed almost every week) that I stopped and became her most vigilant and diligent worker. I had hung all of the streamers from branch to branch in a strange fabric that shimmered black and purple in the candle light. It was a minutes work and just added an extra touch of other-ness. What's more, Alice couldn't have objected, for all she wanted to see a staple out of place and chastise me for my earlier behaviour but with a dress promised her she softened up and all was forgotten. We could all go a little nutty sometimes and willing perfection was not the worst she could force upo us.

In three days we had gutted out the bottom floor of most walls, holding the roof up (which we had made taller by a few feet after Alice had finally let me change it), with tree trunks that seemed to grow up through the ceiling and seep through the floor. We had put them through the floor, to anchor it and replaced the carpet with boards of the same colour to the trees, under all the moss and if you looked from outside, sure enough a chorus of small birds would be sat in the branches that just appeared on the roof, tendrils of branches sweeping across the front of the cream coloured cottage.

At the back of the now massive inside room hung a lusciously thick, velvet curtain for each of the two cubicles that were there, the velvet a beautiful purple that matched the hand-painted strings of flowers that rose from the base of the cream walls and stretching to the middle of the walls. It was breathtakingly beautiful I had to admit and, as I hung some of the most gorgeous dresses I had 'made' I marvelled at what a little mystery could add to a place. The long driveway was strung with little coloured pots, candles inside them making the landscape point to nothing but the little house on the hill. It was a work of art in itself as rustic pots (meaning they looked as if they hadn't been cleaned after being retrieved from the attic for the first time in a decade, but in a tasteful way) with different patterns held small shrubs, or water and rose petals littered the edge of the floor with spotlights shining on the artwork hung from sawn off branches of the trees.

We were all stood around as we waited for the people to arrive, tonight being the opening and everything as we would be open at times most convenient for the paying public. we stood in silence, not because of nerves, or because we were tired but because if we even sighed, Alice gave a glare that could curdle milk before the cow giving the to-be-curdled-milk had not even been born yet; it was so we didn't upset the ambience as she put 'The Rakes' CD on quietly behind the counter on the back wall alongside the changing rooms.

I went upstairs to check in the stock room and bring down some of the men's suits along with the bottles of champagne that were in the fridge we had decided to install up there. On the way down, as I stood on the trail of my jeans bottoms, I realised that we weren't really very good advertisements for our little shop as I ran the rest of the way, forming outfits in my head. I figured if I dropped my appearance illusion (I liked them, they made me feel better and safe and like myself) I could manage to give us all new outfits. I certainly hoped so, so as I came down the stairs, very fast and clutching my arm full of goodies they all looked at me, slightly startled at a face they didn't really know. And then at their new clothes: the boys in matching creased black trousers with a different coloured pastel shirt, un-tucked, and a casual blazer. Us girls each had a simple dress on, similar in style with Rosie's in a deep red to match Emmett's shirt, Alice in a lilac to match the walls and Jasper's shirt and I had blue to match Edward.

Alice clapped her hands to her mouth as she realised what we had been wearing before giving me a huge hug with eyes so wide with gratitude I thought they were about to fall from her head which I patted to produce a purple flower on a hair band in her cropped locks. As an after touch I gave us pearl earrings and colourer chokers; if I had not been clutching Edward to stay standing, I would have continued and an irrepressible excitement at my job of dressing people in the outfits of their lives, helping _them _to stand out bubbled up in my chest.

"Hey," Alice said, apparently realising something," this better not count as my dress.

Before I could reply we had all turned our heads to the door, awaiting for the arrival of the occupants of the flash car that was just pulling up the large, circular driveway.

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**_Enjoyed it? Waiting for the next bit? Having as much fun imagining the shop as I did? _**

**_Then REVIEW!_**

**_Cheers_**


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